5 ms·

> I've attended a lecture by John Raven, the publisher of that test, and he doesn't make that claim. I never said that he made that claim. Several other people

by katz 18y ago

> I've attended a lecture by John Raven, the publisher of that test, and he doesn't make that claim. I never said that he made that claim. Several other people compared RAPM and other intelligence tests to determine the g-loading. It was found by other people (not Dr. Raven) that RAPM has a high g loading. Testing for the general intelligence factor and the use of RAPM is widely accepted. Here is an example of a recent article: “Just one g: consistent results from three test batteries”, (Wendy Johnson, Thomas Bouchard, etc...) 2004. Using Google scholar you can find several other results. Even if you reject RAPM as a measure of g, there are less g-loaded tests (such as IQ) that can be used that predicts more or less the same thing (heritability of intelligence, etc...). > The long, careful examination of what the Raven tests show, in conjunction with other evidence, can be found in James R. Flynn's excellent book What Is Intelligence?, which is about to come out in a new, expanded edition. My problem with most of Flynn's books is that he is a political scientist and a passionate left-wing campaigner. He is basically a Gould-light – distorting science to fit his own world view. I usually prefer to read papers or books on intelligence matters from people with a PhD in areas such as educational psychology or neurology when it concerns brain structure (e.g. prof. Haier).

tokenadult 18y ago
My problem with most of Flynn's books is that he is a political scientist and a passionate left-wing campaigner. He is basically a Gould-light--distorting science to fit his own world view. There are a lot of Ph.D. psychologists who disagree with that statement. Here is what Arthur Jensen said about Flynn quite a few years ago, and he hasn't retracted this statment: "Now and then I am asked . . . who, in my opinion, are the most respectable critics of my position on the race-IQ issue? The name James R. Flynn is by far the first that comes to mind." Modgil, Sohan & Modgil, Celia (Eds.) (1987) Arthur Jensen: Concensus and Controversy New York: Falmer. Here's what Charles Murray (all right, not a psychologist nor a geneticist) says in his back cover blurb for Flynn's book I mentioned in this thread: "This book is a gold mine of pointers to interesting work, much of which was new to me. All of us who wrestle with the extraordinarily difficult questions about intelligence that Flynn discusses are in his debt." As Mackintosh (1998, p. 104) writes about the data Flynn found: "the data are surprising, demolish some long-cherished beliefs, and raise a number of other interesting issues along the way." Flynn has earned the respect and praise of any honest researcher who takes time to read the primary source literature. Robert Sternberg, Ian Deary, Stephen Pinker, Stephen Ceci, Sir Michael Rutter, and plenty of other eminent psychologists recommend Flynn's research. As for what we can conclude about the Raven Progressive Matrices test, one thing we certainly can't conclude is that it is not influenced by the cultural background of the test-taker. The test publisher says culture matters in Raven scores. http://www.eyeonsociety.co.uk/resources/RPMChangeAndStability.pdf http://www.eyeonsociety.co.uk/resources/RPMChangeAndStabilit...
- katz 18y ago
  > are the most respectable critics of my position on the race-IQ issue? The race-IQ issue is separate from the issue of general intelligence and neuroscience of the brain. Even if he is a successful political scientist, it would not make him an educational psychologist or neuroscientist. Much of the popularity of Flynn is his opposition to certain views of Intelligence - not his research. > one thing we certainly can't conclude is that it is not influenced by the cultural background of the test-taker With language and cultural negativeness I meant that there is no cultural specific references. One of the main complaints of the IQ test was that it contained western concepts and examples and language (i.e. it was culturally loaded). For example – the pictures in RPM are the same and contains the same meaning from whatever culture you are. Here is a quote from “How Biased are Culture-Loaded Tests?” (Jensen, A): > Probably the best known and most widely used of such tests s Raven's Progressive Matrices (citations). Such nonverbal tests are expressly designed to reduce item dependence on acquired knowledge and to keep cultural and scholastic content to a minimum while getting at basic processes of intellectual ability. Also note that that study did not just use RPM but included a verbal section. The study you gave me showed differences in RPM between what they labelled “cultures” - other authors used other “labels” to try and explain the difference between groups. Here is a quote from the study you gave me: > On the one hand, the absence of cross-cultural differences in RPM scores between cultures which do differ on a variable
  - tokenadult 18y ago
    Thanks for the reply. My friendly response to the suggestion that I should consider mostly what subject a person has earned a Ph.D. in as the basis for whom to believe on what subject is that sometimes good ideas for one subject come from people who learned another subject. Sometimes that's the best way to make progress in a subject that has become stuck in outmoded theories. I observe that Ph.D. psychologists 1) were taken by surprise by Flynn's research on IQ test score trends over time, having initially predicted precisely the opposite trend, 2) proposed very stringent standards for acceptable data before believing the trend was real (and Flynn credits Jensen, who has just the sort of credentials you have recommended, as being especially tough in demanding certain kinds of evidence), 3) reviewed his publications before allowing them to appear in the leading journals in the field of psychology, 4) invited Flynn to attend major conferences written up in specialized monographs with acknowledged experts in psychology, http://www.amazon.com/Nature-Intelligence-No-233-Novartis-Foundation/dp/0471494348 http://www.amazon.com/Nature-Intelligence-No-233-Novartis-Fo... 5) praised his work in standard textbooks on human intelligence, 6) devoted whole monographs specifically to his findings, http://books.apa.org/books.cfm?id=431712A http://books.apa.org/books.cfm?id=431712A and generally accorded Flynn greater honor as a researcher on psychological phenomena than most psychologists gain in a lifetime. http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521741477 http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=978... Anyway, scientific issues aren't decided by credentials, but by data. Flynn found and analyzed some very important data that caused a lot of psychologists to reexamine their assumptions. John Raven takes care to write, "The results surprise many psychologists. Eductive ability has turned out to be more easily influenced by appropriate educational and developmental experience than reproductive ability." In other words, what Jensen and others took as a "culture fair," "g-loaded" IQ test turns out to reflect modifiable educational experiences that children have or do not have.

by katz 18y ago

tokenadult 18y ago

My problem with most of Flynn's books is that he is a political scientist and a passionate left-wing campaigner. He is basically a Gould-light--distorting science to fit his own world view. There are a lot of Ph.D. psychologists who disagree with that statement. Here is what Arthur Jensen said about Flynn quite a few years ago, and he hasn't retracted this statment: "Now and then I am asked . . . who, in my opinion, are the most respectable critics of my position on the race-IQ issue? The name James R. Flynn is by far the first that comes to mind." Modgil, Sohan & Modgil, Celia (Eds.) (1987) Arthur Jensen: Concensus and Controversy New York: Falmer. Here's what Charles Murray (all right, not a psychologist nor a geneticist) says in his back cover blurb for Flynn's book I mentioned in this thread: "This book is a gold mine of pointers to interesting work, much of which was new to me. All of us who wrestle with the extraordinarily difficult questions about intelligence that Flynn discusses are in his debt." As Mackintosh (1998, p. 104) writes about the data Flynn found: "the data are surprising, demolish some long-cherished beliefs, and raise a number of other interesting issues along the way." Flynn has earned the respect and praise of any honest researcher who takes time to read the primary source literature. Robert Sternberg, Ian Deary, Stephen Pinker, Stephen Ceci, Sir Michael Rutter, and plenty of other eminent psychologists recommend Flynn's research. As for what we can conclude about the Raven Progressive Matrices test, one thing we certainly can't conclude is that it is not influenced by the cultural background of the test-taker. The test publisher says culture matters in Raven scores. http://www.eyeonsociety.co.uk/resources/RPMChangeAndStability.pdf http://www.eyeonsociety.co.uk/resources/RPMChangeAndStabilit...

katz 18y ago
> are the most respectable critics of my position on the race-IQ issue? The race-IQ issue is separate from the issue of general intelligence and neuroscience of the brain. Even if he is a successful political scientist, it would not make him an educational psychologist or neuroscientist. Much of the popularity of Flynn is his opposition to certain views of Intelligence - not his research. > one thing we certainly can't conclude is that it is not influenced by the cultural background of the test-taker With language and cultural negativeness I meant that there is no cultural specific references. One of the main complaints of the IQ test was that it contained western concepts and examples and language (i.e. it was culturally loaded). For example – the pictures in RPM are the same and contains the same meaning from whatever culture you are. Here is a quote from “How Biased are Culture-Loaded Tests?” (Jensen, A): > Probably the best known and most widely used of such tests s Raven's Progressive Matrices (citations). Such nonverbal tests are expressly designed to reduce item dependence on acquired knowledge and to keep cultural and scholastic content to a minimum while getting at basic processes of intellectual ability. Also note that that study did not just use RPM but included a verbal section. The study you gave me showed differences in RPM between what they labelled “cultures” - other authors used other “labels” to try and explain the difference between groups. Here is a quote from the study you gave me: > On the one hand, the absence of cross-cultural differences in RPM scores between cultures which do differ on a variable
- tokenadult 18y ago
  Thanks for the reply. My friendly response to the suggestion that I should consider mostly what subject a person has earned a Ph.D. in as the basis for whom to believe on what subject is that sometimes good ideas for one subject come from people who learned another subject. Sometimes that's the best way to make progress in a subject that has become stuck in outmoded theories. I observe that Ph.D. psychologists 1) were taken by surprise by Flynn's research on IQ test score trends over time, having initially predicted precisely the opposite trend, 2) proposed very stringent standards for acceptable data before believing the trend was real (and Flynn credits Jensen, who has just the sort of credentials you have recommended, as being especially tough in demanding certain kinds of evidence), 3) reviewed his publications before allowing them to appear in the leading journals in the field of psychology, 4) invited Flynn to attend major conferences written up in specialized monographs with acknowledged experts in psychology, http://www.amazon.com/Nature-Intelligence-No-233-Novartis-Foundation/dp/0471494348 http://www.amazon.com/Nature-Intelligence-No-233-Novartis-Fo... 5) praised his work in standard textbooks on human intelligence, 6) devoted whole monographs specifically to his findings, http://books.apa.org/books.cfm?id=431712A http://books.apa.org/books.cfm?id=431712A and generally accorded Flynn greater honor as a researcher on psychological phenomena than most psychologists gain in a lifetime. http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521741477 http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=978... Anyway, scientific issues aren't decided by credentials, but by data. Flynn found and analyzed some very important data that caused a lot of psychologists to reexamine their assumptions. John Raven takes care to write, "The results surprise many psychologists. Eductive ability has turned out to be more easily influenced by appropriate educational and developmental experience than reproductive ability." In other words, what Jensen and others took as a "culture fair," "g-loaded" IQ test turns out to reflect modifiable educational experiences that children have or do not have.